National Association of Broadcasters Again Urges Apple to Add FM Radio to iPhones

[citysnaps]

Cook doesn't give a damn about anything other than profit margins

Really. Tell me why Mr. Cook spends many many millions of dollars each year developing new Ax processor chips, producing the industry's best and fastest, year after year? Apple is so far ahead in that area it sure would be easy to significantly roll that development back and put those saved development and older parts dollars into profits.

 

[C DM]

No. Don't add legacy technology into the phone please.

Let's not have speakers or cameras on the phone, I mean that's like technology from over a century ago.
[doublepost=1508385283][/doublepost]

Who the hell listens to radio anymore

People who might need information in an emergency when there's no working internet or cellular coverage?

 

[jw2002]

Not only are you wrong but you also seem angry.

If you stop and think what their point is, it's for emergency use. As in Katrina levels the entire LA/MS coast and took out cellular towers with it. There are still FM waves reaching the area. Everyone clings to their phone before they ever would a stand alone radio.

They can get safety and potentially life-saving updates from said iPhone w/FM chip.

I don't buy the emergency use excuse. A bad enough emergency will take out both FM and cell phones, like what happened in Puerto Rico. The benefit of an FM receiver, if any, is extremely paltry.

And if you are dead set on FM, why not argue for a short wave receiver so that you can do morse code??? After all, that in theory could be used in some extremely rare emergency as well.

 

[macking104]

my last cheapo tracfone lg phone had a radio built in...

 

[AZ63]

What about the phones not even having the necessary hardware and antennas do these people not understand?

I would certainly hope that next year's iPhone would have what it needs to function for FM radio. If Apple had it in the iPod nano, they certainly could manage it in the 4x larger iPhone.
Come on Apple, step up and make it happen. You do lots of things to help society without a thought to the $$$$$. Do this and prove to all the naysayers you are not all about the dollar.

 

[jw2002]

[doublepost=1508385283][/doublepost]
People who might need information in an emergency when there's no working internet or cellular coverage?

People in such situations can use a car radio. Also, car radios will still be working in times of disaster well after a smart phone's battery has drained. This is not a compelling reason for putting an obsolete technology into a smart phone.

 

[JPack]

People in such situations can use a car radio. Also, car radios will still be working in times of disaster well after a smart phone's battery has drained. This is not a compelling reason for putting an obsolete technology into a smart phone.

And the millions of people who take the subway each day? Or the people in an office tower?

 

[orev]

I'm sorry but it is big government and not in a good way. If people want FM radio in their phones they need to buy phones with FM radio. It's as simple as that. This is something the markets can easily sort out just like they did with OLED displays, NFC, FaceID, TouchID, large phones etc...

The argument being made BY AJIT PAI is that it is a public safety issue. IF IT IS a public safety issue (and I don't agree that it is), then he can force companies to include it, JUST LIKE THE FIRE MARSHALL forces people to have a smoke alarm in every room. People will NOT CHOOSE to install these kinds of safety items unless they are forced to. To most people it's an extra cost and they think "how likely is this really to happen to me?" Well, everyone thinks it won't happen to them until their house burns down, and then we ALL have to pay for it through insurance.

In the US we have many rules and regulations that do amazing things. Things are so good here it's easy to completely miss how bad it can get. You want to sleep in a hotel and not have it burn down? You want to eat meat that didn't sit out in a hot shed for 3 weeks? You want to take drugs that actually work to fix your disease? You like drinking water without getting deathly ill? I have been to almost every continent on the planet in both poor and rich countries. Without basic safety protections, things get really, REALLY bad very quickly. I'm not talking about the government telling you how to live every step of your life. People blindly bleating "big government big government" are really the ones with no brain who are just repeating crap they heard on the radio.

But, once again, this is about AJIT PAI being an idiot and making such a stupid statement since he's THE GUY who could resolve the issue if he thinks it's so important.

[doublepost=1508386466][/doublepost]

Logical fallacy. Safety and reliability are selling points to consumers. Businesses will compete and sell those things to you, just like they'll sell you anything else. Government doesn't create and can't guarantee any these qualities. They merely react after the fact with myopic solutions and often toothless, commerce legislation imagined by partisan shills. Samsung managed to make a sell millions of flammable exploding phones, and all government regulations were useless in preventing that. Something worth remembering when engaging in worship over central planning.
---
Apple's only response to the NAB and FCC's 'feature request' should be this:

We would love to hear from you! Please send your product input to:
http://www.apple.com/feedback.

You can't just say "logical fallacy" and make something an actual logical fallacy. And the rest of your post makes even less sense.

 

[JPack]

I don't buy the emergency use excuse. A bad enough emergency will take out both FM and cell phones, like what happened in Puerto Rico. The benefit of an FM receiver, if any, is extremely paltry.

And if you are dead set on FM, why not argue for a short wave receiver so that you can do morse code??? After all, that in theory could be used in some extremely rare emergency as well.

Ever heard of redundancy? A ship operating offshore can broadcast FM. But it certainly won't be able to give anyone LTE.

Just because a storm may have knocked out FM in Puerto Rico doesn't mean an earthquake in California would do the same.

 

[jkichline]

Apple can stuff the radio in the space that use to be the headphone jack. Maybe extra space for usb-c, more battery, and additional camera.

That's why they got rid of the headphone jack already... for the Taptic Engine, camera, etc. Next?
[doublepost=1508387254][/doublepost]

most radio frequencies in the air interfere with our reception on a day to day basis anyway. I'm pretty sure that apple just wants its users to not get free music out of fm radio and they want customers to spend 10 dollars every month for apple music. samsung has fm radios in their flagships but if they had a music streaming service they probably would cut out the chips for future phones (in samsung phones you use your headphone cable as an antenna and download a 3rd party app and you can tune into whatever station you like)\but then again

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?A=details&O=&Q=&ap=y&c3api=1876,{creative},{keyword}&gclid=Cj0KCQjw95vPBRDVARIsAKvPd3LMQLi50jZMSkkAm0-Mzt3d04HT3YVV9Nk_ro1MlDIeAK-MZPkI21UaAnsOEALw_wcB&is=REG&m=Y&sku=1104989

theres that solution, its a bit bulky but whatever

The hardware doesn't support it. Older iPhones may have the chip in a dormant state, but not connected to anything. So what do you want to do, sell a mod kit to solder the pinouts on the chip to a headphone jack and then hack iOS to somehow activate the FM transmitter and create an SDK to change channels? What about it not being possible do people not understand?

 

[AZ63]

My comment is specifically about the irony that the head of the government organization who has the power to tell companies to do something that he himself says is a public safety issue isn't actually using his power to do that (if it really is such a huge safety issue as he says it is). Instead he's begging like a little baby for them to do it. If he really thought it was such a big issue, he could make them do it. Otherwise if he understands the free market at all, he would already know that begging like a little b*tch isn't going to get them to do it. I'm using his own words, not mine.

How did you feel about Clinton's V-chip he forced into tvs? For or against?
More or less of a nanny state move than this would be?
Did cars put in seat belts by themselves or were they forced by government?
Were people continuing to buy cars when they didn't have seat belts?
I grew up never wearing a seat belt now the car doesn't move until the click is made. Radio waves travel farther so accessing info. would likely be far easier and more reliable than cell.
For me the questions are pretty straight forward. Greater access to information by the public, cost is minimal compared to the V-chip which had to be developed, and finally the ability to include it has already been proven in even lesser expensive devices. All in all, seems like a no brainer. Cost to Apple is negligible all things considered, especially when other cell phones have it and the public benefit upside is huge.
Just do it Apple and win the day.

 

[Mike Reed]

And the millions of people who take the subway each day? Or the people in an office tower?

Those people live in such densely populated areas that their ability to get emergency information isn’t really tied to their personally having an FM receiver.

Honestly though, anyone that can afford an iPhone can easily afford one of those cheap, wind up disaster flashlight/radio deals if they want a disaster readiness kit.

 

[Crzyrio]

You may not like that, but prefer radio. Less choice means more people using Apple's services.

really? The App Store gives users more options of radio to listen too than any city in the entire world with FM transmission.

 

[C DM]

People in such situations can use a car radio. Also, car radios will still be working in times of disaster well after a smart phone's battery has drained. This is not a compelling reason for putting an obsolete technology into a smart phone.

Ah, yes, everyone has a car in general, and in particular in an emergency where they might not have access or even use of one.

And obsolete technology like camera or speakers that were invented over a century ago and therefore must be old and useless and would just be crazy to have in a smartphone?

 

[JPack]

Those people live in such densely populated areas that their ability to get emergency information isn’t really tied to their personally having an FM receiver.

Honestly though, anyone that can afford an iPhone can easily afford one of those cheap, wind up disaster flashlight/radio deals if they want a disaster readiness kit.

So the people trapped in subway cars don't need to get emergency information?

Lug around a wind up radio wherever you go or ask Apple to connect the Qualcomm LTE modem to an antenna. It's pretty obvious which option makes more sense.
[doublepost=1508389557][/doublepost]

Ah, yes, everyone has a car in general, and in particular in an emergency where they might not have access or even use of one.

And obsolete technology like camra or speakers that were invented over a century ago and therefore must be old and useless?

The car radio option makes complete sense.

Especially to the one million car owners in Texas that were flooded during Hurricane Harvey.

 

[fairuz]

I'd appreciate if these stupid organizations would keep their hands off my phone.

 

[C DM]

I'd appreciate if these stupid organizations would keep their hands off my phone.

Because it would be horrible to have the ability to listen to radio (without the need for a cellular/data signal)?

 

[fairuz]

Because it would be horrible to have the ability to listen to radio (without the need for a cellular/data signal)?

Because if Apple doesn't want to install a radio for design reasons (maybe added bulk?), I sure don't want to see the corporate radio channels' lobby group NAB or the anti-net-neutrality Pai pressure them into it. And no, I don't care about FM radio. I'm trying to figure out how to replace the one in my car with an aux port.

 

[Robert.Walter]

NAB is jumping in because an FM tuner might increase their listeners. Folks are tuning out from radio as they stream their music commercial free and to their own playlists.

It could be that Pai(d) wasn’t really the one who started this on his own. He is essentially a paid lobbiest who runs the fcc. He was probably their stalking horse in order to bring up the issue so NAB could pile on.

 

[fairuz]

NAB is jumping in because an FM tuner might increase their listeners. Folks are tuning out from radio as they stream their music commercial free and to their own playlists.

It could be that Pai(d) wasn’t really the one who started this on his own. He is essentially a paid lobbiest who runs the fcc. He was probably their stalking horse in order to bring up the issue so NAB could pile on.

I'm not the conspiracy theorist type, but I admit Pai is suspicious because of his stance against net neutrality.

 

[pratikindia]

FM will be useless in catastrophic situations without power.

 

[Teammm]

Dear Ajit Pai,

The way you get companies to do things for the public good is to REGULATE THEM using YOUR GOVERNMENT-GRANTED POWER to do so. You are the head of the damn FCC, so if you want them to do it, make them! Groveling like a baby does not make companies do things voluntarily.

Signed,
The Taxpayers who want you to do your job and stop being an industry stooge.

Exactly! And Well said.

 

[fyun89]

You can solve antenna issue by using the earphone wire as an antenna.... oh wait


Jk.. I am all in for advancement.

But Apple you're just making excuses. Problem is that the phone only relies on cellular network.

Radio travels further and it is a perfect backup network!!!

 

[asopublic]

Yup, and it is, right up until the cell towers get burned...

KQED radio also lost their transmitter in Santa Rosa--sigh

 

[broadbean]

The bit about the reference to the iPod nano I don't understand is, without plugging in the headphones, there's no antenna so no signal. If you're in an area that would benefit from receiving radio broadcasts, rather than relying on an iPhone with some sort of antenna/wired headphones plugged in that lasts a day at the most if you're lucky, wouldn't a dedicated FM radio with batteries that last months (or even a hand cranked one) be a better solution?